


All That Mattered

by nagi_schwarz



Series: Foxtrot [54]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-18
Updated: 2016-02-18
Packaged: 2018-05-26 19:59:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6253921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagi_schwarz/pseuds/nagi_schwarz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set during SGA Season 5, Rodney's POV of the events at the end of <a href="http://ficsco-and-nagi.livejournal.com/24316.html">Everything and Nothing</a>, from the <a class="i-ljuser-profile" href="http://comment-fic.livejournal.com/profile"><img class="i-ljuser-userhead"/></a><a class="i-ljuser-username" href="http://comment-fic.livejournal.com/">comment_fic</a> prompt: "Stargate Atlants, John Sheppard/Rodney McKAy, reaction when one of them was believed dead/missing and unexpectedly returns".</p>
            </blockquote>





	All That Mattered

Rodney was in Control arguing with Zelenka over one of the panels that wasn't responding when the gate began to activate. Chuck said,

"Incoming wormhole."

Rodney's heart skipped a beat. Was it an emergency? Or...no. He'd stopped hoping. They'd all stopped hoping. After the funeral, Lorne had given Rodney the folded American flag, ostensibly to send back to Earth to the brother John never talked about. The flag was still in its box in John's old quarters that no one had entered since the funeral.

Amelia frowned at her computer. "None of our teams are due for check-in yet." She radioed for Lorne, who ordered marines into the gate room on standby.

They always prepared for an emergency, and in the hundred and fifteen days since John had vanished in the middle of a routine mission - natives saw nothing, knew nothing - an unscheduled off-world activation had proved an emergency every time.

But Rodney couldn't stop hoping.

Lorne arrived in Control moments later, armed, ready to direct the marines as necessary. He was a good commander, and Major Teldy was a good XO. Maybe it was Rodney's imagination, but he thought Lorne was still uncomfortable with his promotion, wore his new mantle with unease. After Rodney, Teyla, and Ronon, he'd fought the hardest to extend the search for John past six weeks.

"Incoming radio transmission," Chuck said. "Not Earth-based tech. Not Genii either."

The Genii and the Tau'ri weren't the only ones with radios in the galaxy.

Rodney's pulse stuttered again when a familiar voice, thick with exhaustion, crackled over the radio receiver at Chuck's control panel.

"Atlantis, this is Sheppard." He recited his IDC, which was apparently a reference to some song about a girl named Jenny, and more than one person cracked an involuntary grin.

"It's been six weeks," Chuck said softly, covering the mic so John couldn't hear. "His IDC's been deactivated."

"You moron," Rodney snapped, "it's obviously him."

Lorne took a deep breath, closed his eyes. "It sounds like him, but it could be –" A really good Wraith hybrid impersonator. Some other human impersonator. Human-form replicator. Some other kind of clone. So many possibilities. Each one dashed Rodney's hope.

"I know my IDC's probably been deactivated because I've been gone so long," John said, "but I really, really want to come home if you don't mind."

Lorne asked Amelia to page Woolsey.

"It's good to hear your voice, sir," Lorne said.

"Yours too, Major. What do you need me to do? Gate over to the Alpha site? Have Keller check me over there? Think fast, because I got a pretty good head start on those guys, but they're pretty damn determined."

Woolsey arrived. "Sheppard," he said. "We were beginning to think you were –"

"Dead? Me too. Couple of close calls there."

"Who captured you?"

"Not entirely sure. Didn't recognize their uniforms. Didn't stick around long enough to ask. What do I need to do so I don't get splattered against the shield around the gate?"

Woolsey took a deep breath. "Prove you're you."

"They could have tortured a whole lot out of me," John said.

Teyla and Ronon had arrived when Rodney wasn't looking. Teyla leaned into the mic.

"John, are you all right?"

"Better than expected, considering. Do you need me to prove I know Earth culture? Simpsons quotes? Sing a Johnny Cash song? C'mon. Time's kind of a precious commodity for me right now. Look, fill the gate room with marines, they can take me down if I get feisty. I honestly don't have the energy to be feisty."

"Sounds like a good idea to me," Rodney said.

John chuckled. "Hey, Rodney. I'm surprised you haven't insulted me for being stupid enough to get kidnapped again. Or did you just arrive, reluctantly dragged from another ZPM experiment?"

Rodney raised his eyebrows at Woolsey. "See?" he hissed. "He knows all about us."

Woolsey took a deep breath, looking thoughtful.

John said, "Guys, I think I'm about to have company."

"How do we know you are who you say you are?" Woolsey asked.

Rodney poised, eager. Everyone had security questions on file that only they could answer in case they were somehow compromised. He knew the answer to John's question, of course. They were best friends.

But John said, "Get Sergeant Ceccoli. We were in Afghanistan together. He knows things about me that no one else does."

Rodney felt like he'd climbed a staircase and lifted a foot to step on a stair that wasn't there, disoriented and off-balance. Lorne ordered Ceccoli to step out of the formation of marines surrounding the gate and come up to Control.

Ceccoli obeyed immediately like the good little grunt he was, but he looked bewildered. He was a marine. What would John have been doing with marines in Afghanistan? Rodney didn't know much about the military, but he knew branches of the armed forces didn't mix often, not like at the SGC.

Lorne dragged Ceccoli over to the mic.

Ceccoli leaned in, cleared his throat. "Sir, this is Sergeant Ceccoli."

John said, "Victor, this is Foxtrot."

Ceccoli went white, but he swallowed hard and nodded. "It's him. Let him through."

Woolsey ordered Chuck to drop the shield, and Lorne ordered the marines to raise their weapons, and then John Sheppard stepped through the wormhole, hands raised in surrender. He was wearing his uniform pants and a t-shirt, but he was barefoot and unshaven. He looked like he'd been dunked in water on a regular basis - torture, most likely - but not like he'd bathed. He was too thin. There were bruises on his face beneath his beard. His gaze was hollow.

The marines swarmed him, herded him to the infirmary. Woolsey, Lorne, Teyla, Ronon, and Rodney followed. Ceccoli, Rodney noticed, stayed behind.

Keller insisted on keeping all unnecessary personnel out of the infirmary till she was done checking him over. Lorne left a couple of marines as security just in case, and then he and Woolsey left to discuss recon on the planet John had just come from, to find out who his captors were. Keller allowed Teyla to hug John, and for Ronon and Rodney to both speak to him briefly, and then she kicked them all out.

Rodney shuffled back to the lab, but Lorne took Ronon and Teyla on the recon mission to the planet John had just escaped from. Ceccoli went with them.

In the lab, Rodney couldn't concentrate. He vacillated between feelings of overwhelming relief and joy and another emotion he couldn't put a finger on, because John was back, John was alive and safe, but he'd asked for Ceccoli, a virtual stranger, instead of Rodney to prove who he was. How? Why? That made no sense.

Jennifer radioed him as soon as John could receive visitors, so Rodney stormed the kitchen and bullied the KP marines into making John's favorite snack (but they were so glad to have him back it really didn't take much bullying) and then headed to the infirmary. John was sitting up in bed, looking a little sulky in a hospital gown. He had an IV and a massive bottle of water.

"Keller says she's keeping me for a couple of days," John said. "As you can imagine, my hosts didn't have the greatest room service, so I'm a little malnourished and dehydrated."

"Are you all right?" Rodney asked. He glanced over his shoulder to make sure none of the nurses were looking right at him, then handed John the illicit snack.

The way John's eyes lit up was gratifying. "You're the best." He unwrapped the package, and a smile lit his face. "My favorite. I've missed you so much." The way he closed his eyes and moaned around that first bite of brownie would have been pornographic if he didn't look like a POW who'd probably been tortured.

"Me, or the brownies?" Rodney asked.

"Both," John said, but because he was John, "but mostly the brownies."

Rodney took a deep breath. "Do, uh, do you want to talk about it?"

"Keller's already got me scheduled to see the base psych as soon as I'm out of here. I think I'm going to be talking about it more than I want to."

Rodney nodded. "Of course. Lorne took a bunch of marines to the planet you dialed in from to see what he could find out."

"Woolsey and Lorne came in for a quick debrief while Keller got me all settled in," John said. "You can sit in on the full debrief later, if you want. I don't know much. Same old same old, you know? Kidnap. Prison. Aggressive questioning. Escape."

Aggressive questioning. What an unpleasant euphemism.

"Teyla and Ronon went with him," Rodney said.

John raised his eyebrows. "I'm surprised you didn't."

"Strictly military for now, Lorne said. Wanted to clear the place and secure it before we go poking any tech."

"Lorne's a smart guy. I'm sure he took good care of Atlantis while I was gone."

"He's not you," Rodney said in a low voice.

"In some ways, he's better."

"No." Rodney surprised himself with his vehemence.

John looked away.

"Lorne took Ceccoli with him," Rodney continued. "I didn't realize you two knew each other in Afghanistan. Lorne made it sound like you barely know any of the new marines."

John's expression went dangerously blank in a way Rodney had never seen but would see again months later when he showed John what Ceccoli had been working on in his spare time.

"He was in the Army then. What happened was classified."

Clearance for Stargate Command was pretty much the highest clearance ever, but Rodney wasn't about to press the issue. "I'm glad he knew you well enough to get you home."

"Me too," John said, but he didn't sound like he believed it.

For a few weeks after that, everyone tiptoed around John, was extra nice to him. Rodney tried to be as normal as possible. Lorne and Teldy both looked relieved at their demotions. Rodney overheard the new psych talking to Keller. John was fit for duty. He was a very resilient man. A little too resilient for comfort, if Keller's assessment of his torture injuries was correct. He was taking it a little too well. But there were no cracks in his shell. He was John Sheppard, alive and whole. Rodney was glad to have him back.

Rodney was also unaccountably cranky at Ceccoli. The first time Ceccoli came asking for spare bits to tinker with - everyone in Atlantis had their side projects - Rodney blew him off, but after a screaming match with Zelenka, Rodney grudgingly admitted that he was being petty to Ceccoli for no good reason, and so Rodney let him have access to whatever spare bits he wanted.

John was home, and that was all that mattered.


End file.
